


It Is No More

by Callisto



Category: The Professionals
Genre: Holidays, Humor, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-07
Updated: 2011-05-07
Packaged: 2017-10-19 02:45:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/195963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Callisto/pseuds/Callisto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's the lads, a caravan in Scotland, and a dead sheep...</p><p><i>“Mate. It’s a sheep. A dead sheep.”</i></p><p><i>“I know that! I know the bloody thing’s dead, Bodie!”</i></p><p><i>“Well, you should. You stepped on it.”</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	It Is No More

“Doyle?”

Nothing.

Bodie sighed, kicked a foot under the small caravan table.

“Ow! What?”

“Mate. It’s a sheep. A _dead_ sheep.”

“I know that! I know the bloody thing’s dead, Bodie!”

“Well, you should. You stepped on it.”

“You’re not helping.”

“Could I? Even if I wanted to?” He grinned when Doyle glared at him. “Far better to mock and enjoy from downwind, sunshine.”

Doyle bit his thumb some more and looked morosely out the window again. It was getting dark, and the Scottish islands were about to do their usual and dump a bucketload of rain after giving everyone a glorious and blustery sunny day first. Studying Doyle’s gloomy profile, Bodie realised with a pang he was not going to get the frolics he felt he richly deserved until Doyle got this dead sheep out of his brain.

Not Bodie’s fault that he’d been the one shoving and pushing at Doyle as they’d wound their way back across the darkened dunes from the one and only pub. It had been Doyle’s, for being so good at taking off the barman’s accent and sour demeanour. So naturally, it had been Doyle who had then stumbled onto the body of a sheep, which seemed to have slid down a sandbank and broken its neck some time that afternoon.

“Look. We’ll walk over and tell the farmer in the morning, and he can come and bury it, or collect it, or do whatever it is they do with dead sheep around here." He waggled his eyebrows suggestively, but Doyle was having none of it.

“It’ll smell,” said Doyle fiercely. As if that were Bodie’s fault too.

Bodie thought about hitting him. “By morning? In this climate? Don’t think so.”

“There are _kids_ in the next caravan over, Bodie. What if they find it?”

Tempted to point out that for a couple of loud-mouthed teenagers in Sex Pistols T-shirts, it was probably not going to be the most traumatic event of their lives, Bodie closed his mouth and gave up. He really was just prolonging the inevitable.

So he slapped Doyle’s knee and started easing himself out of the small bench seat.

“Come on, you delightful sheep-shagger. Up.”

“Eh?”

Bodie rolled his eyes. “Up. You are clearly not going to let this go, and I want my leg over before sunrise—

“Charming.”

—so I reckon you, me, a shovel and a torch should get us in bed before dawn. Get moving.”

Ten rain-swept minutes later, and Bodie wondered if they were both out of their tiny minds. Actually grateful for the kagool he had mocked Doyle for buying, he pulled the hood a little tighter and angled the torch as yet another icy raindrop skidded off his nose. Christ...

“Come on, Doyle. Bloody hell!” The things he did for love.

“What did you just say?” Doyle looked up from his digging, equally bedraggled, but with a fucking _grin_ plastered across his face.

Bodie froze. Metaphorically as well as physically. He hadn’t said that last bit aloud, had he?

“Nothing. Just get a move on, will you?” He tried to sound fed up, but Doyle was still smiling as he bent down to carry on shovelling. Bodie shook his head anyway. Only Doyle could look happy burying a sheep.

When it was done and the sheep was safely under a couple of feet of unmarked dune, Doyle brushed off his hands and gestured back to their caravan with a tilt of his head.

“Come on, I’m freezing. I need something to warm me up.”

No mistaking the nature of Doyle’s grin this time. Typical.

Bodie grabbed his arm on the way past. It had stopped raining, and there was no reason he couldn’t turn the tables a bit.

“Oi. Not so fast, you. No marker, Raymond? No words of remembrance?”

“It’s a sheep, you twat.”

“It’s a...? Well allow me, then.”

He shone the torch up past his chin and took a deep breath.

“It has passed on. This sheep is no more. It has ceased to be.”

“Bodie, I swear..."

“What? Words from the heart these are, sunshine.”

“Words from the dead parrot sketch more like. You are unbelievable.” But Doyle was smiling again. In fact, Doyle was...

When it was done, Bodie opened his eyes slowly and licked his lips. “I can’t believe you just kissed me over the body of a dead sheep.”

“I can’t believe you reciting Monty Python made me want to.”

Doyle was still nice and close, and Bodie took a moment to enjoy the delicious absurdity of a life that had brought him an ex-copper, a clapped out caravan, and a dead sheep at midnight as the epitome of good times.

Doyle skated a finger down Bodie’s cold, wet nose and stepped back. “Come on, let’s get you inside before something vital freezes up and falls off.”

As they headed back, Bodie couldn’t resist. “It has expired and gone to meet it's maker! This is a late sheep!”

“Yeah, all right, Bodie. Ha-ha. You’ve made your point.”

“It's a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in peace!”

Bodie broke off, because as much as he was enjoying himself, Doyle had stopped walking. There was enough light spilling out from the caravan now to see the expression on Doyle’s face.

“Too much?” Bodie asked, grinning and unrepentant. He was on holiday after all.

Doyle shook his head in clear despair and started walking again.

“If this is Bolton, I shall return to the pet shop!”

Doyle turned round and pointed a finger at him. “That’s it, I’m cutting you off. And keep your bloody voice down!”

“The palindrome of Bolton would be Notlob! It don’t—

Doyle’s hand arrived flat across his mouth when he whirled on his heels and got back to Bodie in one long step. Doyle was breathing hard, but Bodie reckoned it was with the urge to laugh more than anything.

So Bodie licked his hand.

Just to see.

And yeah, Doyle truly did have one of the best laughs ever.

******


End file.
